More Gabriele and Lovino stuff, feat. gelato-sicles; Antonio and Lovino have a conversation that honestly has been a long time coming; and Lovino meets the rest of the Jones-Williams

Also, no intermission this chap because I couldn't think of something to do. Sry.

TW for homophobic language

Sorriso park, Italy (Age 12)

"Do you ever think about how life would be if you were a girl?"

Lovino paused, midway to biting into his gelato-sicle. "What?"

"You know, if one little thing changed and you were a bella instead of, well, you." Gabriele sighed, resting his head on his bent knee. "It's weird to think about… How easily everything could've been different."

"You're weird, Gabri," Lovino shot him a look out of the corner of his eye, mouth full of gelato, "And if you were a girl, you'd be a really weird one."

"What, you don't think I'm pretty?" Gabriele laughed and Lovino laughed with him, despite the memories of dinner stories and sharp nails on his cheeks poking at the back of his mind.

"I think you're full of it."

Gabriele nudged Lovino, nearly knocking him off the bench. Dummy, doesn't even know his own strength. "No, but really. What if you were a girl, what do you think you'd be like?"

"I'd be a horrible girl, with all the fights I get into. Not to mention the mouth on me; damn, I don't think I'd survive long by myself before someone'd try and beat some sense into me, girl or not."

"I'd protect you if you were a girl," Gabriele met Lovino's eyes, so sure in his statement that Lovino's heart skipped a beat. "Plus, the guys around here don't bother cute girls, even if they are mouthy."

Lovino snorted, "Who's saying I'd be cute?"

"I am." Gabriele said it flippantly, but Lovino's stomach still flipped at the words. "I mean, you're good looking now, just imagine you with some curves and long eyelashes; you'd be a knockout. You'd probably look like your mom, but without the bottle blonde hair."

"Are you saying you think my mom's hot?" Lovino quirked a brow, trying to laugh it off even though his heart was beating harder than it ever had before. Stop that. He's just saying you'd look okay as a girl, just to be nice. And shouldn't you be getting offended by that!?

"I'm saying that if your dad was out of the picture, she'd have to beat off the boys with a cane."

"And you'd be right there with them, right?"

Gabriele took a bite of his own snack. "Blondes aren't really my type."

"Then what is your type? Please, tell me, so I can have something to tell the girls at school when they harass me about it."

Gabriele shrugged, looking at Lovino with way too much intensity. Lovino's breath caught, suddenly aware of how small the bench was, of how much he and Gabriele were touching.

"You'd be my type. If you were a girl, that is."

The Peeter's home, Present day

Lovino scanned the crowd, cursing his average height, looking for a bow-topped blonde.

"If it isn't my favorite Italian!" Lotte released Vash's arm to give Lovino a really fucking tight hug (he had forgotten that Lotte's arm game was strong, both literally and figuratively). "You made it! Not that you'd dare to not go to one of my parties, of course."

"Hello Lovino," Vash Zwingli - Lotte's bodyguard/protective boyfriend, a terrifying guy who had once knocked Alfred out with an apple thrown from 30 feet away - nodded at Lovino, apparently not perturbed by the fact that his girlfriend was still hanging off of the Italian. Lovino didn't know whether to be insulted or thankful. Vash continued, "Süsse, I think your brother is trying to spike the punch. Again."

"He just won't give up will he? Be a dear and go stop him please, Vash. And tell him if he keeps it up, I'll tell mother about the stuff he keeps under his floorboards!" Lotte waved Vash away before rounding on Lovino again. "So, I saw you come in with Kirkland and some boy. Was that your plus one?"

"It's not like that, but yes." Lovino rolled his eyes, "Not that it matters; I don't know why you give out invites if you don't enforce them."

"Because official invitations mean that it's a 'respectable gathering' and father will pay for it. We rich kids have to play the game, you know how it is," Lotte shrugged, before switching the topic back. "Anyway, info on this new guy; name, age, reason why he's here if 'it's not like that'?"

"Matthew Williams-Jones, our age probably, and he's a project because he has a huge crush on the Albino for some reason. Also, I'm still not gay."

Lotte hummed noncommittally, and she probably would've continued harassing him, if Antonio hadn't shown up at that moment.

"Lovi, gracias al Dio, that took- Oh, hi, Lotte!"

"Oh, Antonio. I forgot that you were here."

Antonio beamed, "Of course! I'd never miss a friend's party!"

Lovino cut off Lotte's probably-going-to-be-passive-aggressive reply. "What the fuck are you doing up here?"

"Kirkland and Franny came back and they said they hadn't seen you and-"

"And I told you to stay down there and get to know Matteo."

Lotte and Antonio both echoed 'Matteo', Lotte in a curious, confused manner and Antonio in a downright growl. Before Antonio could get started on his dumb jealous tirade - because Lovino could feel it coming, like a storm off the sea - Lovino cut in.

"Is there anywhere that the idiot and I can go to talk? Preferably someplace with less people."

Lotte pointed to the patio door and Lovino wasted no time dragging Antonio out there.

"Okay, what the hell is your problem?"

"My problem is that you ignore me for a day, and only start talking to me again when you need a place to take your other friends!" Antonio huffed, "Not to mention that you ditched me for some other guy."

"Are we really doing this now? Here, of all places?" The patio wasn't as crowded as inside, but there were still people there.

Antonio nodded, resolute. "If I let this go now, you'll do that dumb avoiding thing, again, and we'll never talk about whatever this is, and we can't keep tiptoeing around it."

Lovino rolled his eyes, because honestly. "Can you just chill for a couple of hours and we can hash this out somewhere less public?"

"No, Lovino, because it'll never happen! Just because you're all 'conceal, don't feel' doesn't mean-"

"What? Are you, are you accusing me of being emotionally repressed?"

"Yeah?" Antonio scrunched up his face like he couldn't believe that Lovino was arguing against it. "You sort of are. Like, really repressed."

"Excuse you!? No, I'm- I cannot believe that you-!" Lovino was not repressing anything and How dare that bastard say otherwise! "No. You want to know why I keep putting it off, do you really? It's because you act like an annoying, obsessive child, and I don't think you can handle a discussion about anything more serious than the score of last night's Real Madrid game."

There was a gasp, and a quiet 'ooo, burn'. The fog of anger cleared a bit, and Lovino was suddenly aware that there were at least five other people around. Shit.

"Look, Antonio-"

"At least I'm nice! Maybe if you weren't such a dick, people who aren't in love with you would be willing to at least pretend to tolerate you!"

"People who aren't in love with you", the words hovered in air after the rest of the sentence had faded into the wind.

Fuck.

Antonio froze, moving only to belatedly clamp a hand over his mouth, as if willing the words to go back to being a heavy, unsaid cloud over their 'best friendship'. It wasn't a surprise, Lovino wasn't dumb, but blurting it out during a argument? This is cliche as fuck. My life isn't a fucking romcom. Regardless of the ridiculousness of the situation, Lovino was still affected because, well, it was a love confession.

"I'm... I'm not..." Lovino mumbled, before clearing his throat. He recomposed himself, remembering that he was a Vargas, damn it, and he could fix this. "Ahem, thanks for the life lesson, boy-meets-world. I'll try to be more pleasant in the future."

Lovino even threw in a believable eye roll, ready to pretend that Antonio hadn't just said he was in love. Which is why he was surprised when Antonio groaned.

"You know what," Antonio started, one hand planted firmly on his forehead. "Fuck you, Lovino. I try, realmente, I do. I pour so much into this, whatever this is, and you can't even not treat this like a joke."

Lovino startled, because Antonio only cursed when he was upset, and he didn't know where he had gone wrong. Lovino had seen the hope mixed in with the embarrassment and surprise in Antonio's eyes, and what else could he-

Oh my god.

"Oh my god." Lovino ran a hand through his hair and choked out a laugh, desperately hoping it didn't sound as hysterical or nervous as he thought it did. "You think I'm in love with you too."

"Um, yes? I thought that was where this was clearly going."

"Oh my fuck, Antonio, I'm-" A man, a Vargas, normal- "Not gay."

"What." Antonio looked like someone had just told him a huge, world shattering secret.

"I'm straight. As a line. I've had girlfriends - you've met them and everything! - how did you not see this coming?"

"I thought those were covers; 'beards', you know? None of them ever lasted long and you never seemed sad about breaking up or them dating other guys, and I mean, I dated a couple girls before I was officially out, so I just thought..." Antonio had furrowed his eyebrows, and he looked so genuinely confused that Lovino wanted to both laugh and cry. "Are you sure, because you totally flirt with me, Franny and a bunch of people said so! And you check me out sometimes when you don't think I'm looking! Not to mention how you hated Jules because you thought we were dating, remember?"

"What? No! I'm not into you, Antonio, we're friends."

If '?' could be rendered as a sound, it'd be the noise that Antonio made.

"But-but, the kiss! You kissed me and didn't hate me instantly!"

"That was a dare, it doesn't count," Lovino ran a hand down his burning face. "And we said 'no homo', so it was okay."

Antonio gave Lovino an incredibly unimpressed look. "Are you seriously using 'no homo' as a reason that kissing me didn't count? No homo is the number one way to know that something is homo. Totally straight people don't do stuff that requires you to say 'no homo'."

"I guess they do, because I'm straight and I used it unironically. Wow, no homo actually meaning no homo, what an amazing concept!" Lovino was, admittedly, a bit hysterical now, because Antonio was wrong, he was obviously seeing things through rose-tinted lenses, and Lovino Vargas was straight straight straight straight.

"Are you sure? Because I mean, how can you know if you never-"

"Jesus fucking christ, Antonio, I'm not a fag!"

Everything went silent as the word hung in the - thick, too thick - air. Lovino's eyes widened, not quite believing that he had said that. "Oh god, I- I'm so sorr-"

"The others are probably wondering what's taking us so long. We should get back downstairs." Antonio's carefully neutral face betrayed no emotion and it was wrong wrong wrong, because Antonio was pure emotion, and Lovino had done this, but it was an accident and he, he-

Lovino grabbed at Antonio's arm as he began to walk past. "Antonio, I didn't-"

"Whatever, Lovi. We can just pretend it didn't happen," Antonio looked back, his smile fake and huge and positively blinding, "You're good at that, right?"

Lovino followed him back inside. He walked downstairs and started talking to everyone and did absolutely nothing to apologize. He just went back down there, bullied Matthew into accompanying Julchen upstairs, did his matchmaking magic, meditated on what a complete fuck up and overall huge dick he was, and then pretended that absolutely nothing happened. Lovino was a coward.

Guinevere kept shooting him weird looks, because something had obviously happened - Antonio was basically ignoring him, which had only happened once before - and the whole thing was so weird and unsettling that Lovino honestly couldn't think of anything to do besides play along for twenty of the most awkward minutes of his life.

When the twenty minutes were up, he was so tired of Antonio ignoring him everything that he nearly sprinted upstairs, grabbed Matthew from Julchen (Who looked annoyed that he was taking Matthew, a good sign) and, after assurance from Alice that she would be sleeping over at the Beilschmidt's, left. It wasn't until he was already at Matthew's house that he realized that he'd be alone that night.

Alone. No Antonio to call or text at ridiculous times - God no, not after what had just happened - no Ali three rooms away. Just him, the creaky old building, and his thoughts.

"Want to go over to my house?" He asked without thinking, because social creepiness was less important than being stuck alone in that huge, suffocating house.

Matthew looked back at him with eyes almost as round as his glasses, "What?"

Lovino thought fast and deciding to go with his default "moody teen", he huffed and looked out his window. "I just suggested it because it would make it easier to brainstorm ideas to get the Mercury Lamp to notice you if you stayed over, but whatever." Lovino grimaced slightly at the comparison of Julchen to an anime character. He had to stop letting Alice guilt him into marathons with her and Sakura.

"No, no, I mean, I'd have to ask my parents, but that'd be great!" Matthew's surprisingly not creeped out voice startled Lovino a bit. "But, uh, 'Mercury Lamp'?"

"Julchen," Lovino clarified, before mentally cursing his use obscure anime references and the fact that no one ever got them.

"Oh, okay, cool. So just let me go ask my parents and pack a bag? You can come in if you want?" Matthew phrased his sentences like questions, his voice lilting at the end.

Lovino shrugged in answer and got out with the blond, heading up to the house.

"Okay, fair warning, my mom is...Well, she's not bad, per say, she's just..." Matthew paused at the door, taking a deep breath. "A lot like Al; I'll leave it at that. If you're lucky, then we'll only run into maman."

Lovino scrunched his face in confusion, "Wha-"

Lovino didn't finish because within the next second Matthew had opened the door and a huge, Snow White beast of some kind had attacked him. He heard a woman yell "Kuma!" but he was a bit preoccupied trying to get a creature that weighed roughly half as much as him to stop getting drool all over his face and hair and clothes.

The woman and Matthew got the creature off of him and Lovino busied himself wiping the gross spit off of his face.

"I'm so sorry for that, Kuma just gets overexcited... all the time," The woman apologized, drawing Lovino's attention.

Lovino blinked. She was pretty, probably still in her early 30's, and looked a great deal like Matthew, right down to the coke bottle glasses and the weird colored eyes. This must be the mom, Lovino thought, and laid on the charm thick. "It's fine, signora. I've dealt with worse."

She smiled gently, before blinking rapidly like she was just remembering something. "If you don't mind me asking so, um, who are you?"

"How rude of me; perdonami, signora. I'm Matthew's..." Lovino paused, hand held out, because 'Matchmaker' probably wouldn't be the best way to end that sentence. "School friend. Lovino Vargas."

She gasped, wide eyes dashing between Matthew and Lovino. "You're Matthew's friend?!" She said finally, voice filled with incredulity. Lovino held back a laugh at the despair on Matthew's face. "I'm sorry; I've just never met one of Matthew's little friends... other than that slightly terrifying German girl that came over once. I have to- Amelia will be ecstatic."

The woman ran back inside, much to Matthew's apparent distress. Lovino, however, was back to trying to get Matthew's pet polar bear thing to stop biting at his shoes. "You took the time to warn me about your mom - who was a fucking delight, for your information - but you didn't think to tell me that you were harboring a hellhound."

Matthew sighed with the air of someone who had had to explain something a lot, and began heading inside. "That was maman. Maman's normal... mostly. It's mom that I'm worried about."

Lovino filed that away, and took a moment to appreciate the decor. It was nice, with lots of family pictures and trinkets and random family stuff. Even though a lot of it looked like a weird clash of classical beauty and regular junk, it sort of fit, in a nice, homey way.

"Eh?"

Matthew's soft, questioning noise drew Lovino out of it, and he realized he must've been mumbling again. Lovino flushed brightly. "I meant that in, y'know, a good way. Looks lived in and comfy and shit."

Matthew looked at him oddly, but couldn't ask as another woman came sliding down the hall (Literally. She was wearing socks and sliding on the hardwood and she almost ran into them).

"So I hear that my Mattie's brought someone home! A Vargas, right? Oh gee, isn't he just fancy-looking? What was your name, again, sugar?" The woman leaned into Lovino's personal space, and he reflexively stepped back. "My 'Annie is just the worst with names and by the time she started talking she couldn't remember what it was."

Lovino, still slightly put off by her proximity and loudness, answered, "Um, Lovino, ma'am."

She laughed brightly and, yeah, this must be 'Mom' because Lovino could see that Alfred was basically a more annoying, make reflection of her. "He said 'ma'am', ain't that just the cutest thing? It's just Amelia, kiddo!"

Amelia stuck her hand in Lovino's face, and Lovino took another minute step back before gently shaking it.

"Mom," Matthew interrupted, thankfully, before Lovino could become more flustered by her energy, "Can I stay over at the Vargas' tonight?"

A squeal came from around the corner. "Ohmondieu, our little Matthew wants to have a sleepover!"

Matthew groaned, 'why do bad things happen to good people?' written in his face. "Maman, please stop."

Amelia winked at the boys, "Yeah 'Annie, they're teenagers now, and teenagers don't have 'sleepovers', right? They have some other lingo for it."

Matthew's Maman - 'Annie'? - winked as well, her eyes glittering behind her glasses, "Oh, oh, je vois! Oui, Matthieu, you can go 'hang out' at your friend's house tonight!"

"Merci, mères," Matthew began pulling Lovino to his room, not allowing his mother's another word. "Dieu, they're embarrassing."

"I don't know, they seem nice," Lovino shrugged, staring blankly at the wall - hockey teams and snowboarders, plus a couple family pictures - pushing thoughts of his own Mother off doing god knows what with no regard for her children. "At least they try."

Matthew blinked at Lovino, but didn't ask, and Lovino was thankful.

END ACT ONE

So. That was something.

I've gotten semi-attached to Gabriele and, after I had my own sexuality crisis, I've realized that he's actually really important for Lovino's development, as Lovino's first friend who's interest is a bit more than platonic. Let me be 100% clear, spamano will be the eventual ship. Antonio is in love with Lovino, or at least he thinks he is. Lovino has, at the most, a crush right now.

When I was originally planning, this was supposed to be like 8 chapters and Lovino was going to get over his internalized homophobia super quick and Gabriele was a miniscule plot point and the spamano would end up adorbs in no time, but then I actually started writing. Antonio and Lovino have a lot of problems, like Antonio's obsessive possessiveness and Lovino's emotional repression, but the largest one is both of their tendency to ignore/hold in things until they explode, thus their argument in this chapter.

We're gonna get to the ship, okay, but as we go along, I'm realizing that this is a lot more complex than originally planned. Antonio and Lovino have a lot of growing up to do before they can even think of a relationship.

Oh, also, I don't know if I mentioned this before but Lovino's mom is nyo!2p!Romano. The Williams-Jones are Nyo America and Canada.

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